Jun. 6, 2014
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The NBA Finals started Thursday. / Bob Donnan, USA TODAY Sports

by Jeff Zillgitt, USA TODAY Sports

by Jeff Zillgitt, USA TODAY Sports

SAN ANTONIO -- When the NBA announced its plans to use a 2-2-1-1-1 home-away format for the NBA Finals starting this season rather than 2-3-2, league executives listed business and basketball reasons for the switch.

One particular reason stood out at the very important crossroads of business and basketball.

"We were more likely to have a longer series than a change in outcome. You're more likely in a 2-2-1-1-1 format to get a Game 7 but you're not more likely to have a different outcome," then-deputy NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said in October.

A longer series, including a Game 7, is good for basketball and good for business.

Compelling, high-stakes, drama-filled basketball. More interest in the NBA. Higher TV ratings. It all potentially leads to more money for the league and its players.

Of the 438 series in the 2-2-1-1-1- format in NBA history, 114 â?? or 26% -- have been determined in seven games, compared to just 17.2% of series going the distance in the 29 Finals series played in the 2-3-2 format from 1985 through 2013.

The 2-3-2 format does not provide a huge sample size. But three of the seven-game Finals series happened in the past nine seasons, and no seven-game series were played from 1995-2004.

But there were other reasons. With the 2-3-2 Finals format, the NBA had a perception problem, according to Silver.

The team with the better record faced not only a week on the road but it was also stuck with the possibility of a 2-2 series with an pivotal Game 5 on the road, as was the case last season for the Miami Heat against the San Antonio Spur last year. This year, that game would be in San Antonio.

"There is a sense that (2-3-3) skews the competition, but it's not backed up by the data," Silver said in October when the league announced the switch back to the 2-2-1-1-1 format. "Our data shows that the team, the likelihood of a team winning in a 2â??3â??2 format of the favored team is the same as in the 2â??2â??1â??1â??1 format. But there certainly was a perception that it was unfair to the team that had the better record that it was then playing the pivotal Game 5 on the road.

"This, obviously, moves that game back to giving home court advantage to the team with the better record if it's a 2â??2 series."

At the 2008 Finals, then-Boston Celtics coach Doc Rivers raised the topic of having the best record in the league but playing Game 5 on the road against the Los Angeles Lakers. Stern addressed the issue then and said he had no problem with 2-3-2 but said, "Everything is open. We'll take it up if the board wants to do it. We're not married to that."

In the past five years, the NBA continued to discuss the change, and NBA president of basketball operations Rod Thorn gave a presentation on the 2-2-1-1 format at the Board of Governors meeting in October.

"People were ready for it, and the committee felt that was the way to go," Thorn said. "You try to present. Here's what happened under 2-3-2. Here's what transpired under 2-2-1-1-1 and from our perspective, we think it's something we should look. We had a discussion and then we had a vote and decided to do it."

After the presentation, there wasn't much to discuss.

"Easy sell," Stern said then. "Rod Thorn presented it, there was a motion in the book, so moved, seconded, all those in favor, aye. There was no descent."

But Silver is right. Data does not support that the team with home-court advantage is at a distinct disadvantage in the 2-3-2 format.

Since 1985 and the advent of the 2-3-2 format, the team with home-court advantage was 21-8 in the Finals (72.4%), and in that same time, the team with home-court won 75.8% of the series played in a 2-2-1-1-1 format through the first three rounds of the playoffs. It's a difference, but negligible.

In the mid-1980s, Stern heard Celtics executive and former coach Red Auerbach complain about the back-and-forth travel problems for teams in the Finals. In those days, teams still traveled on commercial flights, not the chartered and more comfortable jets teams use today.

"I tell you that Red said to me back in '84, this is too much; play, travel, play, travel, play, travel," Stern said in 2008. "In subsequent years he said it was terrible that we changed it to 2-3-2, but a young commissioner was motivated by the father of us all."

Stern also said the 2-3-2 format was implemented to accommodate reporters, making it easier and more affordable for them to cover the Finals. For this year's Finals, the NBA offered chartered jets for a fee for reporters.

Players don't care either way. The Heat and Spurs have had plenty of experience in both formats.

"No matter what the format is, you have to play each game," Heat guard Dwyane Wade said. "Both of these teams are capable of winning anywhere. You wouldn't be in this position if you weren't."